Early history WRM Motors Ltd began in 1912 when
bicycle manufacturer
William Morris moved on from the sale, hire, and repair of cars to car manufacturing. He planned a new light car assembled from bought-in components. In this way he was able to retain ownership by keeping within the bounds of his own capital resources. A factory was opened in 1913 at former
Oxford Military College at
Cowley, Oxford,
United Kingdom where Morris's first car, the 2-seat
Morris Oxford "Bullnose", was assembled. Nearly all the major components were bought in. In 1914, a coupé and van were added to the line-up, but the Bullnose chassis was too short and the 1018 cc engine too small to make a much-needed 4-seat version of the car.
White and Poppe, who made the engine, were unable to supply the volume of units that Morris required, so Morris turned to
Continental of
Detroit, Michigan for the supply of a 1548 cc engine.
Cecil Kimber, head of Morris's own original 1909-founded Morris Garage sales hire and repair operation in Oxford, began building sporting versions of Morris cars in 1924 labelling them
MG. They were so successful a separate MG factory was soon established south of Oxford in
Abingdon-on-Thames,
Berkshire. Having admired Budd's all-steel bodies Morris founded
The Pressed Steel Company of Great Britain Limited in 1926 as a joint venture with
Edward G Budd Manufacturing Company - Budd International of Philadelphia, USA. Pressed Steel's factory was located over the road from Morris's factory at Cowley and supplied Morris and many other motor manufacturers. Morris withdrew from the venture in mid-1930. Budd sold their share to British interests at the beginning of 1936. The small car market was entered in 1928 with the
Leonard Lord-designed
Morris Minor, using an 847 cc engine from Morris's newly acquired
Wolseley Motors. Lord had been sent there to modernise the works and Wolseley's products. The Minor was to provide the base for the
MG Midgets. This timely spread into the small car market helped Morris through the economic depression of the 1930s. At the 1934
London Motor Show the Minor was replaced by the
Morris Eight, a direct response to the
Ford Model Y and, though Leonard Lord's handiwork, heavily based on it. In 1932 W R Morris appointed Lord Managing Director of Morris Motors Limited and Lord swept through the Morris works, updating the production methods, introducing a proper moving assembly line and creating Europe's largest integrated car plant. But Morris and Lord fell out, and after 15 years Lord left in 1936—threatening to "take Cowley apart brick by brick". Lord moved to Austin and they were to meet again in BMC—Morris, as Lord Nuffield, its first chairman. Lord succeeded him. As of 1 July 1935 Morris Motors acquired from W R Morris, now Lord Nuffield, in exchange for a further issue of ordinary shares to him, the car manufacturing businesses of Wolseley Motors Limited and The MG Car Company Limited. A separate private company,
Wolseley Aero Engines Limited, was then formed to continue the development of his aviation interests. In 1936 Lord Nuffield sold
Morris Commercial Cars Limited, his
commercial vehicle enterprise, to Morris Motors. In 1938 William Morris, Baron Nuffield was raised to Viscount Nuffield. The same year he transferred his newly acquired
Riley car business to Morris Motors Limited for £100. , Leeds
Iron lung Visiting London in 1938 during a
polio epidemic Lord Nuffield saw a Both
Iron Lung in use. He commissioned an improved design which could be produced using the techniques of car assembly and arranged production of approximately 1700 machines at the Cowley works, which he donated to hospitals throughout all parts of Britain and the British Empire. Both-Nuffield respirators were able to be produced by the thousand at about one-thirteenth the cost of the American design.
Significant subsidiaries Second World War In the summer of 1938 Morris
agreed to build, equip and manage at government expense a
huge new factory at
Castle Bromwich specifically to manufacture
Supermarine Spitfires. with intention to build bombers later. Nuffield's management failed; no Spitfires were delivered by May 1940 despite expectation of 60 a day. The
Ministry of Aircraft Production took over the plant putting in managers from Supermarine and placing it under
Vickers-Armstrongs (of which Supermarine was a part) supervision. After a major air raid damaged the Morris Bodies factory, the premises switched to the production of
jerry cans, producing millions of these versatile containers for use during the rest of the war and following the ending of hostilities. The Cowley plant was turned over to aircraft repair and production of
Tiger Moth pilot trainers, as well as "mine sinkers" based on a design produced at the same plant during the First World War. which subsequently merged with
Leyland Motors in 1968 to form the
British Leyland Motor Corporation (BLMC), and subsequently, in 1975, the
nationalised British Leyland Limited (BL). The Cowley complex remained the second largest single facility in the BL empire (after
Longbridge), but BL's history was a turbulent one – BMC was close to financial ruin, and the newly installed Leyland management failed to turn its fortunes around. With the replacement for the
Morris Marina and
Leyland Princess being delayed into the 1980s, the Marina was restyled in 1980 to become the Morris Ital, while the Princess was restyled for 1982 to become the
Austin Ambassador. British Leyland later confirmed that the Morris brand would be discontinued on the all-new replacement for these two cars, which was finally launched in April 1984 as the
Austin Montego. The
Morris Ital (essentially a facelifted Marina) was the last Morris-badged passenger car, with production ending in the summer of 1984. The last
Morris of all was a van variant of the
Austin Metro, before the Morris brand was finally completely abandoned in 1987. After much restructuring of BL in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the former Morris plant at Cowley and its sister site the former
Pressed Steel plant were turned over to the production of Austin and Rover-badged vehicles. They continued to be used by BL's
Austin Rover Group and its successor the
Rover Group, which was eventually bought by
BMW, and then by a management consortium, leading to the creation of
MG Rover. None of the former Morris buildings now exist.
British Aerospace sold the site in 1992; it was then demolished and replaced with the Oxford Business Park. The adjacent former Pressed Steel site (now known as Plant Oxford) is owned and operated by BMW, who use it to assemble the
new MINI. The history of William Morris's business is commemorated in the Morris Motors Museum at the
Oxford Bus Museum. Post-Morris cars to have been built at Cowley include the
Austin/MG Maestro,
Austin/MG Montego,
Rover 600,
Rover 800 and (for a short time) the
Rover 75.
Cancelled revival Following the bankruptcy of the
MG Rover Group in 2005, three competing bids were launched aiming to acquire the company's assets. One of the bids, led by
Maserati CEO
Martin Leach alongside
Chinese state-owned
Shanghai Automotive Industries Corporation (SAIC), included plans for a Morris Minor revival. Despite this, the bid was lost to the
Nanjing Automobile Corporation and the new Minor was not produced, although Nanjing Automobile Corporation later merged with SAIC, with all assets, including the Morris marque, being transferred to SAIC. ==Badge==